What s. Out There. Miami

What’s Out There Miami ® South Florida Dear What’s Out There Weekend Visitor, Welcome to What’s Out There Weekend Miami, organized by The Cultural...
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What’s Out There Miami

®

South Florida

Dear What’s Out There Weekend Visitor, Welcome to What’s Out There Weekend Miami, organized by The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF). The materials in this guide will tell you about the history and design of the places you can tour during this free event, the ninth in a series that we offer each year in cities and regions throughout the United States. Please keep this guide as a reference for future explorations of the greater Miami area’s significant landscapes.

Photo courtesy The Biltmore Hotel

The Cultural Landscape Foundation (TCLF) TCLF provides the tools to see, understand and value landscape architecture and

On April 12th and 13th, during What’s Out There Weekend Miami, residents and visitors have opportunities to discover more than thirty of the region’s publicly accessible landscapes through free, expert-led tours. Miami and South Florida’s landscape legacy extends from its Spanish Colonial roots to the present, where strong Modernist, Beaux Arts, and Mediterranean design concepts from Europe and the Eastern U.S. are expressed in unique gardens, parks, plazas, estates, and streetscapes. Explore Miami and South Florida landscapes through tours that include entertaining anecdotes and intriguing stories about city shaping, landscape architecture, and the city’s design history. The tours reveal the story behind these valued places and the individuals who designed or made them. What’s Out There Weekend dovetails with the Web-based What’s Out There, the nation’s most comprehensive searchable database of historic designed landscapes. The database currently features more than 1,500 sites, 10,000 images, and 750 designer profiles. In 2013 What's Out There was optimized for iPhones and similar handheld devices, and includes a new feature – What's Nearby – a GPS-enabled function that locates all landscapes in the database within a 25-mile radius of any given location. On behalf of The Cultural Landscape Foundation, I thank you for participating in What’s Out There Weekend and hope you enjoy the tours.

its practitioners in the way many people have learned to do with buildings and their designers. Through its Web site, lectures, outreach and publishing, TCLF

Sincerely,

broadens the support and understanding for cultural landscapes nationwide to help safeguard our priceless heritage for future generations.

learn more at tclf.org

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The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Charles A. Birnbaum, FASLA, FAAR President and Founder, The Cultural Landscape Foundation



www.tclf.org

3

Floridas Tpke

Golden Lakes

Southern Blvd

Forest Hill Blvd

882

10th Ave N

Lake Worth

95

Lake Worth Rd

802

7

812

Hypoluxo Manalapan

Hypoluxo Rd

Range Line Rd

804 711

Ocean Ridge

82195

W Boynton Beach Blvd

Loxahatchee National Wildlife

eH

Florida Tpke

Lin

Floridas Tpke

Kings Point

wy

817

997

Coral Springs

869

Margate

Sunrise

838

75

811

Lighthouse Point

Kendall Green

A1A

973

Northlake Blvd

Sunset

814 Kendale Lakes

Kendall North Lauderdale Lakes 870 West

90

Hillsboro Beach

Pompano Beach

94

Oakland Park

Wilton Manors

Hammocks Melrose Park

Plantation

Mi

am

iR

1

A1A

Jupiter

Miami

ive Donald Ross Rd r

••

Flamingo Rd

818



817

Cooper City

Dania

Stirling Rd

95

•• •• ••

Kendall

Sheridan St

157th Ave

Pembroke Pines

Blvd

75

7

Key Biscayne Riviera Beach Palm Beach Shores Mangonia Park

Hallandale Golden Beach

Norland

Estates

Glades



915 909

Sunny Isles Bal Harbour

882 Lake

Cutler Ridge

Century

Cutler

••

Golden Lakes Haverhill

(Homestead)

••

98

Okeechobee Blvd

Golfview

Glen Ridge

704

Focus on Mediterranean style Found primarily in the California coastal zone from Santa Barbara to Los Angeles and in Florida boomtowns including Miami, Boca Raton, Palm Beach, and Sarasota, this variant of the Beaux Arts/Neoclassical style was popular in the American Country Place Era (late 19th century to the Great Depression). Taking hold in popular culture and made possible by a fecund Mediterranean-like climate, these designs – often defined by orthogonal geometry and axial design elements – benefited from an internationally diverse plant palette that ranged from old roses and bougainvillea to citrus, palms, cacti, and cycads planted in outdoor rooms and courtyards. Typically employing Beaux Arts/Neoclassical plans, forms, and elements from Italian Renaissance/Baroque and Islamic-era Spanish and Mediterranean prototypes, the style sometimes drew from multiple sources on a single property.

➋➊ Atlantic ➌ ➍ Ocean ➎➏Atlantic Ocean Palm Beach

In California the style featured local plants adapted to the arid climate paired with limestone architecture developed from existing local Spanish Colonial precedents. Along with Lockwood de Forest, Jr., such noted designers as Paul Thiene, A.E. Hansen, Richard Requa, and Charles Gibbs Adams popularized this style in California. In Florida, imported subtropical plants and oolitic limestone construction were employed in civic landmarks, subdivisions, and estates to create an appearance of history and permanence. In Florida the style was promoted by developer George Merrick, artist Denman Fink, architects Addison Mizner and August Geiger, and landscape architects Diego Suarez and Frank Button.

List of sites Palm Beach

Miami and Key Biscayne

➊ Cluett Memorial Garden

⓱ The Barnacle Historic State Park ⓲ Bayfront Park ⓳ Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park ⓴ Crandon Park •• The Kampong •• Little Havana •• Vizcaya Museum & Gardens

➋ Henry Morrison Flagler Museum ➌ Four Arts Botanical Gardens and Philip Hulitar Sculpture Garden

➍ Memorial Fountain Park ➎ Pan's Garden ➏ Worth Avenue



Delray Beach/Deerfield Beach/ Fort Lauderdale

Coral Gables and Pinecrest

➐ Bonnet House Museum and Gardens

•• Biltmore Hotel •• Merrick House •• Venetian Pool •• University of Miami Campus

➑ Deerfield Beach City Arboretum ➒ Flamingo Gardens ➓ Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens North Miami Beach/Miami Beach

S Ocean Blvd

Opa-Locka

9

South Miami 1 Heights

994⓬ 826

147

almetto Expwy

Perrine



702

S Olive Ave

817 Miami Lakes

821

704



West Palm Beach

152nd St

168th St

Ives Blvd Southern

Andover

The Cultural Landscape Foundation Golden 826

A1A

Pembroke Park

858 184th St

162nd Av

4

95

A1A

Lake Park

Cypress Lakes

87th Ave

441

Miramar

Hollywood

136th St

Royal Palm Beach 992

⓲1

Gables

874

Richmond Heights

84

Juno Beach

Palm Beach Gardens

Fort Lauderdale

736

Riverland

Pine Island Ridge Davie

⓮ ⓭⓯

Miami Beach

N Dixie Hwy

595

Arvida Pkwy

195

395

Broward Blvd

Weston

Surfside

Pga Blvd •• 953 786 •• 1 •• •• 5 976 ⓱ North Palm Beach •• Coral •• 809 ⓴ Lake Worth

Atlantic Ocean



922

95

944

811

Lauderdale-By-The-Sea

Lindgren Acres

St 104thLauderhill

Central Blvd

41

South Miami

Sea Ranch Lakes

Commercial Blvd

441

Oakland Park Blvd

y

xpw

sE

ras

wg

845

Boca Raton

42nd St

56th St

Atlantic Blvd

Tamarac

Sa

834

710 Sweetwater Westchester

Deerfield Beach

Coconut Creek

948

9

836

Boca Del Mar

95



Parkland

Miami Springs

SW 107th Ave

798

137th Ave

BROWARD COUNTY

800

Tamiami

157th Ave

PALM BEACH COUNTY

794

Glades Rd

W Palmetto Park Rd

95

Highland Beach

Boca West

808

27

95

Clint Moore Rd

441

953

d



Pinewood

n Blv Ocea

Doral

E Atlantic Ave

SW 87th Ave

El Clair Ranch Rd

Hagen Ranch Rd

Gulf Stream Delray Beach

B 806 ee

826

Sunny Isles Bal Harbour

Biscayne Park Indian Creek Miami Tequesta Shores Jupiter Inlet Colony 934 North Bay

924

Hialeah

Boynton Beach

North Miami

Westview

955

706

Rainbow Lakes Aberdeen

909

915

Opa-LockaA1A

924

Hialeah South Palm Beach Gardens Lantana

Atlantis Lantana Rd

26 - Venetian Pool

95

Palm Springs Greenacres City

441

Atlantic Ocean

826

Glades

9

Floridas Tpke

Wellington

Glen Ridge

Jupiter IslandGolden

826

Miami Lakes

Palm Beach S Ocean Blvd

98 882 Lake

704

Haverhill Golfview

S Olive Ave

441

704

Okeechobee Blvd

Palmetto Expwy

N Dixie Hwy

997

Century

1

Norland

Photo courtesy City of Coral Gables

702

817

h Rd

711

West Palm Beach Cypress Lakes Royal Palm Beach

708

Riviera Beach Palm Beach Shores Mangonia Park

⓫ Ancient Spanish Monastery ⓬ Greynolds Park ⓭ Lincoln Road ⓮ Miami Beach Botanical Garden ⓯ Miami Beach SoundScape Lincoln Park ⓰ South Pointe Park



Mediterranean style sites

Photo by Lisa Marie Jacobs

Lake Park

95

eac

76 726 DADE COUNTY

City of Coral Gables

•• Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden •• Matheson Hammock Park •• Pinecrest Gardens Cutler Bay and Homestead

•• Deering Estate at Cutler •• Fruit & Spice Park

7- Bonnet House Museum and Gardens

www.tclf.org

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141 S. County Road Palm Beach

Palm Beach 141 S. County Road

Cluett Memorial Garden (Episcopal Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea)

Photo courtesy of the Episcopal Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea

Originally conceived as “The Spanish Memorial Church” commemorating Ponce de Leon’s landing in Florida in 1513, the Episcopal Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea, a Spanish Gothic structure built in 1925, was designed by New York architects Hiss and Weekes. In 1931 Nellie Cluett, whose parents were founding members of the church, hired Walter Thomas of Philadelphia to design a garden in their memory. The small garden, only 1/3 of an acre, reflects an Italian influence, with water features, parterres, and tropical plants orchestrated on two highly-detailed tiers.

Landscape Style: Beaux Arts/Neoclassical

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The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Landscape Type: Institutional Grounds – Religious Designed By: Walter Thomas

Photo courtesy Sanchez & Maddux

Photo courtesy Paul Gervais

Photo courtesy Paul Gervais

The space is entered through the lower Tea Garden, a stone-paved gathering place with carved stone benches that is enclosed by walls and a small Tudor-style building. The contemplative, upper Color Garden is surrounded by a dense stand of palms and has twin gazebos for seating. The two gardens are united by a series of water features that originate with a raised, stone fountain at the far end of the Color Garden. Water flows into a shallow stone rill then continues into a linear sunken pool that bisects the Color Garden. Constructed from local coral stone, the pool is edged by lawn and parterres of cruciform-shaped, clipped boxwood. Water from the pool flows through an opening in a retaining wall and cascades into a raised rectangular basin in the Tea Garden below. The retaining wall, decorated with coral stone, tile and stucco, stone obelisks and ball finials, also incorporates a small arched stone bridge and a pair of wide stone stairs that connect the two levels.



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1 Whitehall Way Palm Beach

Palm Beach 1 Whitehall Way

Henry Morrison Flagler Museum (Whitehall) Photo by Charles Birnbaum

Henry M. Flagler built Whitehall as a gift for his wife, Mary Lily Kenan. Constructed 19001901, the Carrère and Hastings–designed Neoclassical Revival structure, built to rival the mansions of Newport, RI, overlooks the Atlantic and served as the Flaglers' winter residence.

Landscape Style: Beaux Arts/Neoclassical Mediterranean Landscape Type: Garden and Estate Designed By: Carrère and Hastings

Whitehall’s landscape has two components. The mansion itself contains an open-air central courtyard modeled on those of Spanish and Mediterranean palaces. The courtyard’s central feature is a white marble statuary fountain based on the 16th-century Grotticella Venus by Flemish sculptor Jean de Boulogne for the Boboli Gardens in Florence, Italy. The fountain sits on axis with the formal entrance and is framed by four planting beds at the center of the patio. The property is defined by an elaborate ornamental iron fence extending to the oceanfront, and it is the estate’s most significant landscape feature. Enclosing the front lawn, its 20-footwide entrance gates are topped with a high ornamental broken pediment with curved and decorated entablature. Distinct from Newport mansions, Whitehall had no outbuildings or elaborately planned gardens. Its landscape features are limited to a pair of wooden pergolas, marble benches, urns, and the occasional canopy tree. In 1959, Whitehall was saved from demolition by Flagler's granddaughter Jean Flagler Matthews. She established the Henry Morrison Flagler Museum, which purchased the building in 1959 and opened it in 1960. The hotel addition built in 1925 was demolished in 1963. The property was designated a National Historic Landmark in 2000.

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

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www.tclf.org

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2 Four Arts Plaza Palm Beach

Palm Beach 2 Four Arts Plaza

Four Arts Botanical Gardens and Philip Hulitar Sculpture Garden (Society of Four Arts) Photo by Charles Birnbaum

Originally established in 1936 to promote art, music, literature, and drama in Palm Beach, the Society of Four Arts quickly added landscape gardening to its mission with the establishment of seven demonstration gardens between 1936 and 1939. Oriented around a library designed by Maurice Fatio with murals painted by Albert Herter, the demonstration gardens were planned and funded by Four Arts members. Each garden was created in a different style, displaying ornamental tropical fruit production, fragrant night-blooming flowers, diverse rose specimens, jungle plants, and gardens inspired by those found in British, Spanish, and Chinese traditions. In 1956 Innocenti & Webel was commissioned to design a master plan that highlighted specimen plants, improved the garden architecture, and united the seven gardens. In 1965 Four Arts acquired an adjacent property slated for commercial development and established the Philip Hulitar Sculpture Garden in honor of its founder and chief benefactor. The lot remained vacant until 1980 when advocate Hulitar was asked to design a garden wall. Though sculpture was slowly introduced, few significant design efforts were enlisted.

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The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Landscape Type: Institution Grounds – Cultural Botanical Garden Sculpture Garden Designed By: Innocenti & Webel Morgan Wheelock

Photo courtesy Morgan Wheelock

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

The gardens were drastically impacted by a hurricane in 2004, prompting Four Arts to commission a design from Morgan Wheelock. Working from Innocenti & Webel’s master plan, Wheelock united the two gardens and made improvements to irrigation, circulation, and accessibility. Maintained by the Garden Club of Palm Beach and the nonprofit Society of Four Arts, the gardens continue to provide a place of inspiration and quiet contemplation.

Landscape Style: Beaux Arts/Neoclassical Mediterranean



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340 S. County Road Palm Beach

Palm Beach 340 S. County Road

Memorial Fountain Park Photo by Charles Birnbaum

Dedicated by the Memorial Fountain Commission in 1929 and located in the commercial heart of the Town of Palm Beach, the plaza was presented to the town by Harold S. Vanderbilt, its chairman, “as a gift from its residents.” The design was by local architect Addison Mizner. Landscape Style: Beaux Arts/Neoclassical Mediterranean Landscape Type: Commemorative Landscape Plaza Designed By: Addison Mizner

Mizner moved to Palm Beach in 1918 and later that year completed his first commission, the Everglades Club. For the next decade, his celebrated Mediterranean Revival style would proliferate in Palm Beach and Boca Raton with commissions also in Georgia, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut. Memorial Fountain Park, realized during the Great Depression, was one of his last commissions. The design is a simple linear plaza with a central reflecting pool lined by walks, tightly clipped hedges, and evenly spaced palms. On the upper terrace is a central fountain, inspired by the Fountain of the Sea Horses, an 18th century work by Christopher Unterberger at the Villa Borghese in Rome, Italy. Twin sets of staircases running the entire width of the plaza provide access to the upper terrace. The lower staircase on axis with the fountain has a central rill spilling into the pool. The plaza is punctuated by alcoves and walls for seating and entrance piers with urns marking the arrival to the upper terrace and lower plaza. A World War II memorial plaque was added in 1985.

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

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www.tclf.org

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Worth Avenue bounded by Cocoanut Row and S. Ocean Boulevard Palm Beach

Palm Beach 311 Peruvian Avenue

Pan's Garden

Pruned, low-maintenance shrubs called Simpson’s Stoppers surround the garden, separating it from the street, while live oaks and palms create a shady oasis inside. A tile wall rescued from the 1920s-era Casa Apava estate on nearby South Ocean Boulevard provides the backdrop for a fountain and seating area. More than 300 species of native trees, shrubs, grasses, and wildflowers are planted in wetland and upland groupings. Cypress mulch paths meander through the lush subtropical garden while stone and brick paving provides access to the diverse plantings, water features, and seating areas. Demonstration displays of native cultivars are replaced annually to provide visitors with ongoing interest and ideas for their own gardens.

Landscape Style: Mediterranean Designed By: Addison Mizner Paris E. Singer Adley Brisson Engman Bridges, Marsh & Associates Sanchez & Maddux

Photo courtesy Sanchez & Maddux

Photo courtesy Sanchez & Maddux

Photo courtesy Sanchez & Maddux

Photo by Liz Morten, courtesy Dovecote Decor

Following a period of slow decline, Worth Avenue was rehabilitated in 2010 by architects Bridges, Marsh & Associates and landscape architects Sanchez & Maddux. Piazzas, pools, and sidewalks made of crushed shells reference the architectural history of Palm Beach while linked courtyards create protected, open-air civic spaces. A pair of fifteen-foot-tall stone pillars announces the avenue’s eastern end where it meets Ocean Boulevard. A marble clock tower and archway frame the vista to the Atlantic Ocean just beyond.

Photo by Liz Morten, courtesy Dovecote Decor

Designed By: Sanchez & Maddux

Photo courtesy Sanchez & Maddux

Landscape Type: Botanical Garden

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Named in 1913 for General William Jenkins Worth, this shopping avenue was among the first areas developed in Palm Beach. In 1918 architects Addison Mizner and Paris E. Singer introduced the Mediterranean style to the region with their design for the Everglades Club at Worth Avenue’s western end. In 1924 Mizner altered the primarily residential avenue when he designed a three-story mixed-use complex with shopping on the ground floor and residences and offices above. In 1938 area merchants created the Worth Avenue Association to promote advancements. Through the 1940s, the avenue developed to include arcaded shops, intimate courtyards linked by pedestrian “Vias,” and landscape features such as tiled fountains, sculpture, and shaded benches beneath rhythmically spaced coconut palms. Two adjacent streets, Via Mizner and Via Parigi, extend from Worth Avenue and expand the concept of a European-influenced pedestrian village. In 1991 the Town of Palm Beach commissioned the planning firm Adley Brisson Engman to develop design guidelines to protect and enhance the Avenue’s unique character.

Designed by Sanchez & Maddux and constructed in 1994 for the Preservation Foundation of Palm Beach, this botanical garden named for the 1890 Frederick MacMonnies statue of Pan of Rohallion sited in a pool at its entrance includes open air pavilions encircled by native plant demonstration beds. This half-acre site between the Worth Avenue commercial district and adjacent residential areas replaced a parking lot and abandoned building.

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic”

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Worth Avenue



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900 N. Birch Road, Fort Lauderdale Delray Beach/Deerfield Beach/Fort Lauderdale

Delray Beach/Deerfield Beach/Fort Lauderdale 900 N. Birch Road, Fort Lauderdale

Bonnet House Museum and Gardens Photo by David Warren, courtesy Bonnet House Museum and Gardens

Named for a lily that grows in the nearby Bonnet Slough, this 35-acre estate is built upon a barrier island with the Atlantic Ocean to the east and the Intracoastal Waterway to the west. Early settler Hugh Taylor Birch purchased the land in 1895 and gifted it to his daughter Helen and her husband, Chicago artist Frederick Clay Bartlett, in 1919. The couple designed a house that hybridized Mediterranean, Caribbean, and European styles and was wrapped by loggias and surrounded a central courtyard. Following Helen’s death in 1925 Bartlett married Evelyn Fortune Lilly, also an artist, and together they continued to develop the estate's diverse landscape.

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The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Landscape Type: Garden and Estate Designed By: Frederick Clay Bartlett Helen Bartlett Evelyn Fortune Lilly EDSA

Photo by Lisa Marie Jacobs

Photo by Lisa Marie Jacobs

Photo by Lisa Marie Jacobs

The property is comprised of five distinct ecosystems, including a fresh water slough, primary and secondary dunes, mangrove wetlands, and a maritime forest. Melaleuca trees line the driveway leading to an arid plant garden that surrounds the central courtyard. This formal courtyard, with walls and paving of local coral stone, contains tropical plantings and a central terra cotta fountain. Fruit trees extend westward from the house in contrast with a broad lawn that terminates at an open water slough to the east. A colorful pavilion overlooks a freshwater lagoon and the property is bordered by a hardwood coastal hammock. Significantly impacted by hurricanes in 2005, the landscape has been restored by EDSA working with the Florida Trust for Historic Preservation. The house was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1984.

Landscape Style: Mediterranean Picturesque or “Romantic”



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3750 S. Flamingo Road, Davie Delray Beach/Deerfield Beach/Fort Lauderdale

Delray Beach/Deerfield Beach/Fort Lauderdale 2841 W. Hillsboro Boulevard, Deerfield Beach

Deerfield Beach City Arboretum

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo courtesy City of Deerfield Beach

Photo courtesy City of Deerfield Beach

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Preserving the core 60 acres, Mrs. Wray established the Floyd L. Wray Memorial Foundation in 1969 to promote the natural beauty of the Everglades, and the groves were renamed Flamingo Gardens. In 1990 the Everglades Wildlife Sanctuary began constructing habitats there for injured animals. The Free-Flight Aviary, designed at the same time, represents the five distinct ecosystems of the Everglades and provides habitat for more than 250 wading birds representing 45 species. In addition to 50 acres of citrus groves and 20 Florida State Champion trees, Flamingo Gardens preserves rare native hardwood hammock ecology and displays extensive collections of hibiscus, crotons, ginger, helliconia, and orchids.

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic” Landscape Type: Botanical Garden Designed By: Floyd Wray Jane Wray

Photo © Karl Gercens III

Designed By: Harold “Zeke” Landis Florida Chapter, ASLA

With naturalistic plant massings of more than 1500 fruit and flowering trees from five continents, the picturesque qualities of the arboretum are experienced via a half-mile long meandering pedestrian route. In addition to the taxonomic plantings, the arboretum consists of several thematic gardens including the Florida Native Wetland Garden, the Caribbean Garden, the Palm Garden, and the Butterfly Garden. Two picnic shelters near the Wetland Garden and an Azumaya-inspired pavilion in the Japanese Garden provide for shaded gathering. Conceived as a place for contemplation and education, the collection is cared for by volunteer master gardeners and garden enthusiasts.

Photo courtesy Flamingo Gardens

Landscape Type: Arboretum Neighborhood Park

Founded in 1927 as a private botanical collection blended with commercial citrus production, this is one of South Florida’s earliest tourist attractions. Real estate developers Floyd L. Wray and Clarence Hammerstein teamed with citrus grower Frank Stirling to capitalize on the lack of available citrus following a hurricane in 1926. Their initial investment of 320 acres, then called Flamingo Groves, would eventually grow to more than 2000 and included 60 varieties of citrus fruit. By 1930 the Groves were receiving seeds from the federal government for test planting and, capitalizing on the presence of nesting flamingos, had opened for daily visitors. Wray and his wife built their weekend home on the hardwood hammock overlooking the grove; the home now serves as an interpretive museum.

Known locally as The Tree Zoo, this nine-acre park was established on Arbor Day in 1995. The arboretum is located in Constitution Park, dedicated eight years earlier to commemorate the 200th anniversary of the signing of the U.S. Constitution. Following years of planning and tree-collecting, Deerfield Beach City Arborist Harold “Zeke” Landis designed the arboretum and incorporated existing indigenous, long-standing vegetation including mahoganies, live oaks, and Poinciana. Displaying plants in taxonomic and aesthetic groupings, the arboretum was designed by volunteers from the Florida Chapter of the American Society of Landscape Architects.

Photo © Karl Gercens III

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic”

Flamingo Gardens



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4000 Morikami Park Road, Delray Beach Delray Beach/Deerfield Beach/Fort Lauderdale

Delray Beach/Deerfield Beach/Fort Lauderdale 4000 Morikami Park Road, Delray Beach

Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens

Landscape Style: Japanese Landscape Type: Botanical Garden Designed By: Hoichi Kurisu

From 1999 to 2001 landscape architect Hoichi Kurisu designed six gardens at Morikami called “Roji-en: Garden of the Drops of Dew.” Representing diverse design styles from the 9th to the early 20th century, the gardens, built around a centralized pond and meandering stream, reflect Japanese traditions of nature appreciation. Bridges, lanterns, stone pagodas, and raked gravel are incorporated into artful arrangements of flowering trees, shrubs, and palms planted to frame scenic views and vistas within the garden and its surroundings. A museum building constructed in 1993, inspired by traditional tea house architecture with a lakeside terrace and courtyard garden, provides educational and interpretive exhibits.

Photo courtesy Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo courtesy Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens

Photo courtesy Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens

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Photo courtesy Morikami Museum and Japanese Gardens

The 600-acre Yamato Colony, first settled in 1905 by Japanese immigrants on land donated by the community of Boca Raton, provides the basis for this garden referencing historic Japanese design precedents. From 1903 to the 1920s Japanese businessman Jo Sakai provided work on the East Coast Railway in Florida and Georgia for Japanese immigrants. His Yamato Colony grew pineapples and vegetables for export around the U.S. At the onset of World War II, few members of the Yamato Colony remained in the area and the U.S. government confiscated 6000 acres of land for a military installation. Farmer George Sukeji Morikami, the last remaining member of the colony, purchased some of the land at the end of the war where he continued the Yamato farming operation. In 1973 Morikami deeded the property to Palm Beach County who then opened the gardens to the public in 1977.



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17530 W. Dixie Highway, Miami Beach North Miami Beach/Miami Beach

North Miami Beach/Miami Beach 16711 W. Dixie Highway, North Miami Beach

Ancient Spanish Monastery

Greynolds Park

(Monastery of St. Bernard de Clairvaux)

Located in the southeast corner of a former plant nursery on the banks of the Miami Canal, the historic church is surrounded by formal gardens designed in the 1950s by members of the church to be reflective of those found in Spanish monastic gardens. Contrasting with Florida’s typically lush tropical vegetation, the north grounds of the refectory are defined by neatly trimmed hedges that delineate garden rooms. Linear paths encircle religious statues and fountains set in parterre gardens and wide expanses of lawn. Intricately constructed arcades surround the church’s cloister, and provide framed views of the gardens through arched openings. Inside the cloister garden, radial paths made from square cut stone lead to the original church well. The medieval space, contained and ordered, reflects the monastic, agricultural lives of the Cistercian monks. The church, which was purchased from Moss and Edgemon in 1964 by the Episcopal Diocese of South Florida, is now owned by the Episcopal Parish of St. Bernard de Clairvaux and serves the parish and larger community. The church was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.

Landscape Type: Public Park – Neighborhood Park Designed By: William Lyman Phillips Civilian Conservation Corps

Photo courtesy Save Greynolds Park Committee

Photo by Bill Bentley

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo by Robert Mayer

Photo by Bill Bentley

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Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic”

A nine-hole, 58-acre public golf course designed by Mark Mahannah was added in 1964 to the southwest portion of the park. Along the park's western edge, the contiguous Oleta River served as the source for the construction of a lagoon with a stone boathouse and bridges. The boathouse was renovated in 2009 to restore its historic character.

Photo courtesy Save Greynolds Park Committee

Landscape Type: Institutional Grounds – Religious

Greynolds Park was the first of numerous projects in South Florida that Phillips designed and supervised. At Greynolds, he used the natural, picturesque qualities of the mangrove forest and hardwood hammock and incorporated native limestone, coral, and hardwood into the park’s boathouse, picnic pavilions, and camping area. Preserving native vegetation that included gumbo limbo, sour oranges, and royal palms, Phillips also worked with the existing site conditions of the mining operation to transform abandoned rock pits into lakes and created an observation mound atop buried mining equipment. At 46 feet above sea level, the Outlook Mound and Tower remain the highest publicly-accessible landform in South Florida, offering views of the surrounding lagoons and pine forests. Recent development and tree growth have diminished ocean views.

Photo by Rocco Ceo

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic”

One of Dade County's first public recreation areas, this 265-acre park on the banks of the Oleta River was designed by William Lyman Phillips and constructed by the Civilian Conservation Corps between 1936 and 1939. The park, formerly a Seminole Indian trading post and later a rock quarry, was created in 1933 from a 110-acre donation to Dade County by A.O. Greynolds; an additional 100 acres was donated a year later.

This 800-year-old monastery was originally constructed in central Spain and occupied by Cistercian monks. In 1925 the structure was purchased by William Randolph Hearst who had it dismantled, packed into 11,000 wooden crates, and shipped to New York where it remained for 26 years. In 1953 the 33,000 stone blocks were purchased again by investors Raymond Moss and William Edgemon and shipped to Miami, where over the course of nineteen months they were reassembled by stone mason Allan Carswell.



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Lincoln Road bounded by Alton Street and Washington Avenue, Miami Beach North Miami Beach/Miami Beach

North Miami Beach/Miami Beach Lincoln Road bounded by Alton Street and Washington Avenue, Miami Beach

Lincoln Road Photo by Charles Birnbaum

Since it was first mapped in 1912 and designed by Carl Fischer in 1914, Lincoln Road has served as a social center for the city of Miami. Running east to west between 16th and 17th Streets, six blocks of the road were closed to vehicles and converted to a pedestrian mall in 1960, just one year after the opening of Michigan’s Kalamazoo Mall, the nation’s first outdoor pedestrian mall. Designed by hotel architect Morris Lapidus and funded with $600,000 in municipal bonds, the design employs bold geometric paving patterns, Modernist open-air shade structures and arbors, and animated fountains and pools, all knit together with bosques of trees and understory plantings. Anecdotally, Lapidus defended his car-free design, saying “I designed Lincoln Road for people – a car never bought anything.”

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The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Landscape Type: Pedestrian Mall Designed By: Carl Fischer Morris Lapidus Raymond Jungles

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

Photo by Amanda Jungles

Through the 1980s plantings and hardscape slowly deteriorated, but the area was revitalized in the 1990s. In 1997 landscape architect Martha Schwartz replanted native sabal palms, renovated fountains that had fallen into disrepair, and designed a paving pattern that was responsive to the historic structures found on each block. More recently the pedestrian-scale spaces that Lapidus created have been adopted by the restaurants and cafes that line the mall and are populated with movable chairs and tables. Moving west, in 2010 an additional block was added to the mall, designed by Raymond Jungles. Conceived as a water garden employing kidney shapes and biomorphic forms, Jungles’ plan uses biofiltration, native plants, and eye-catching materials to create an urban oasis on the pedestrian mall.

Landscape Style: Modernist



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400 17th Street, Miami Beach North Miami Beach/Miami Beach

North Miami Beach/Miami Beach 2000 Convention Center Drive, Miami Beach

Miami Beach Botanical Garden

Landscape Style: Modernist Landscape Type: Plaza Greens/Commons/Squares Designed By: West 8

Photo © Stephen Dunn Photography

Photo © Stephen Dunn Photography

Photo courtesy MBBG

Photo by Courtney Spearman

Designed By: Raymond Jungles

Photo by Robin Hill

Redesigned in 2011 by landscape architect Raymond Jungles, the garden retains early landscape features including a Japanese Garden and its signature bridge, bamboo collection, and statuary. Additionally, a fountain designed by Morris Lapidus continues to occupy a prominent spot adjacent to the entrance of the Miami Beach Garden Club’s headquarters. Paths paved with pebbles and crushed shells circulate through the naturalistically planted park and a central pond provides the setting for large-scale sculptural features. An expansive greensward, known as The Great Lawn, accommodates large social activities and maintains sightlines to important vistas within the otherwise densely vegetated garden.

Photo by Courtney Spearman

Landscape Type: Botanical Garden

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Located on Washington Avenue and 17th Street, this 2.5-acre urban park was designed by West 8 and opened in 2011. Serving as both park and plaza, the public space replaced a surface level parking lot to provide ancillary space for the New World Symphony Centre concert hall and conservatory concurrently designed by Frank Gehry. A web-like, intersecting network of trapezoidal white concrete paths circulates across slightly varied topography resulting in geometric sections of grassy lawns, dotted with groves of palms and flowering trees. Long curvilinear retaining walls also formed from white concrete double as benches to provide seating amidst sculptural aluminum pergolas inspired by Miami’s cumulous clouds. The pergolas, sited near the park’s perimeter, provide shade, support flowering bougainvillea vines, and accommodate multi-media equipment for public performance events. The exterior surface of Gehry’s concert hall provides a 7500-square-foot backdrop upon which films are projected from the park.

This 2.6-acre urban green space, which preserves and displays collections of South Florida’s diverse plant specimens, is situated on the historic Collins Canal, which helped trigger Miami’s popularization in the early 20th century when mangrove forests native to the area were replaced with polo fields and golf courses to cater to clients at luxury hotels on nearby Lincoln Road. In 1962 a park known as the “Garden Center” was established by the City on a vacant lot adjacent to the Convention Center, which was built five years prior. Plagued by economic recession and hurricane damage, the neglected park was nearly lost. In 1996 local residents formed the Miami Beach Garden Conservancy to form a botanical garden.

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic”

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Miami Beach SoundScape Lincoln Park



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1 Washington Avenue, Miami Beach North Miami Beach/Miami Beach

North Miami Beach/Miami Beach 1 Washington Avenue, Miami Beach

South Pointe Park Landscape Style: Modernist Landscape Type: Waterfront Development Public Park – Neighborhood Park Designed By: Hargreaves Associates Savino Miller

Located on the southern tip of Miami Beach, this 22-acre park overlooks an inlet to Biscayne Bay engineered to be a shipping channel. Following the construction of the Government Cut inlet in 1905, the area remained industrial until the City of Miami Beach located police facilities there in 1979. In 1984 the police relocated several blocks north and was replaced with a park designed by City of Miami Beach landscape architects. The park included an amphitheater, two wooden observation towers, picnic pavilions, and a 522-foot long boardwalk through existing sand dunes. In 2009 Hargreaves Associates and Savino Miller redesigned the underused park to better integrate it with the contrasting settings of the industrial inlet and a burgeoning residential neighborhood. Entrance plazas from two primary streets extend the city’s grid into the park. A serpentine landform and pathway in the heart of the park contrasts with the linear 1800foot long promenade along Government Cut. Active recreation areas comprised of three open lawn areas are planted with native salt-tolerant grasses and mature trees preserved from the former park. Several small tropical gardens, palm bosques, and coastal hammock plantings are adapted to the regional climate. Restored dunes along the park’s southern tip are stabilized by yuccas and sea oats. Promoting sustainability, site grading and plantings capture rainwater, amber lighting is unobtrusive to animal migrations, and locally-sourced fossilized coral serves as paving material. The park includes a large multi-purpose plaza and cafe and an amphitheater overlooking a water playground.

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

Photo courtesy Hargreaves Associates

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Photo courtesy City of Miami Beach



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301 Biscayne Boulevard, Miami Miami and Key Biscayne

Miami and Key Biscayne 3485 Main Highway, Miami

The Barnacle Historic State Park

In 1973, the Florida Park Service acquired the nine-acre property. With wide views of the bay across an expanse of lawn, much of the cultural landscape's naturalistic features remain intact. The park preserves a seagrass bed, tidal swamps, and one of the last and best preserved examples of the once-expansive Miami hardwood hammock. The hammock serves as a vegetative buffer protecting the Barnacle from contemporary visual encroachments. Paths through lush tropical vegetation physically connect the house to the bay. The Barnacle was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.

Landscape Style: Modernist Landscape Type: Public Park – Neighborhood Park Designed By: Warren Manning Isamu Noguchi

Photo courtesy The Barnacle

Photo courtesy The Barnacle

Photo courtesy The Barnacle

Photo by Wally Gobetz

In 1980 the City commissioned Isamu Noguchi to redesign the newly-named Bayfront Park, which had shrunk to 32 acres due to peripheral development. Noguchi convinced the City to demolish the library and re-extend Manning’s pedestrian promenade, which now terminates at a spray fountain surrounded by a paved civic space. Bosques of subtropical trees provide shade for grassy lawns, the rock garden, and several of Noguchi’s sculptures including a monument to the Challenger space shuttle. The War Memorial was updated in the 1990s.

Photo by Wally Gobetz

Designed By: Commodore Ralph Munroe

Photo by Wally Gobetz

Landscape Type: Public Park – State Park

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Known as Miami’s front porch, this park began as a small reserve for political and religious gathering amidst railroad tracks and tidal marsh. In 1922 the City constructed a retaining wall, commissioned Warren Manning, who worked for Frederick Law Olmsted, Sr. in the late 19th century, to design a park, and spent 17 months reclaiming the coastline. Manning’s design for the 62-acre parcel employed meandering paths through palms, tropical almonds, and Royal Ponciana, a circular bed of exotic flowers, and a wide pedestrian promenade that extended East Flagler Street to the bay. Much of Manning’s design was destroyed by a hurricane in 1926. A year later, the City installed a band shell, a grotto, and a rock garden on the waterfront. The U.S. Navy commandeered the park through World War II but permitted the City to install the Dade County War Memorial in 1943. Battered from the military occupation, the park was returned to the City in 1950 and a public library was built obstructing views to the bay.

Situated on a coral ridge of oolitic limestone overlooking Biscayne Bay, this is one of the oldest houses in Miami, and a rare example of a pioneer dwelling that survives with its landscape setting largely intact. Influenced by traditional Caribbean construction methods and materials, Commodore Ralph Munroe built the house as a private residence in 1891. The house, partially constructed from timber salvaged from shipwrecks, which is set on stilts to maximize natural circulation and to avoid flooding, has survived numerous hurricanes and tropical storms. Munroe’s original boathouse, built in 1887 to house his extensive collection of maritime designs, was destroyed by a hurricane in 1926. Undaunted, Munroe built another moored by cables to protect it from storm surges.

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic”

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Bayfront Park



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4000 Crandon Boulevard, Key Biscayne Miami and Key Biscayne

Miami and Key Biscayne 1200 Crandon Boulevard, Key Biscayne

Bill Baggs Cape Florida State Park

The park began with a 100-acre acquisition in 1966 and is named for Bill Baggs, who was editor of The Miami News from 1957 to 1969, civil rights champion, and outspoken advocate for the preservation of Key Biscayne’s natural qualities. Development further north on the island and dredging, soil spreading, and canal building have altered the island’s topography; an 8,400-foot long boulder seawall protects the western and southern shores. Through extensive restoration of the barrier island ecosystem, 350 acres of mangrove swamp, maritime hammock, and coastal strand communities have been preserved. In addition to the barrier preserves the park includes hiking trails, bike paths, fishing and watercraft facilities, interpretive exhibits, and more than a mile of sandy beaches. Cape Florida Lighthouse was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1971.

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic” Landscape Type: Public Park – Large Neighborhood Park Designed By: William Lyman Phillips

Photo © Steven Brooke

Photo courtesy Miami-Dade County

Photo courtesy Miami-Dade County

In 1992 Hurricane Andrew caused extensive damage to the park. A year later Artemas Richardson of Olmsted Associates developed a master plan that employed vegetation to screen the Tennis Center from the park, transformed the abandoned zoo into a botanical garden, and opened views from Crandon Boulevard to the sea. Crandon Park protects three archaeological deposits and 450 acres of ecological preserves.

Photo c ourtesy Bill Baggs State Park

Photo c ourtesy Bill Baggs State Park

Photo c ourtesy Bill Baggs State Park

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

In exchange for the construction of the Rickenbacker Causeway from Miami to Key Biscayne, the Matheson family, in 1940, deeded to Dade County 975 acres of their massive coconut plantation to be used as a park. William Lyman Phillips designed the causeway and park, both of which opened in 1947. Phillips organized the park into east and west sections separated by the coconut palm-lined Crandon Boulevard. He designed two rectangular parking areas for more than 3,400 cars straddling a wide, east-west oriented pedestrian promenade lined with palm allées. The promenade transitions to arcing paths that access two miles of white sand beaches dotted with palms, cabanas, and picnic shelters on the eastern side of Key Biscayne. Phillips incorporated local coral rock, botanical specimens, and a dredged lake into his design for a 48-acre zoo, open from 1948 to 1980. In the 1950s a carousel, narrow-gauge train, and roller-skating rink were added. In 1972, Robert von Hagge and Bruce Devlin designed an 18-hole golf course on the western side of Crandon Boulevard and in 1991 the expansive 13,300-seat Crandon Park Tennis Center was introduced.

Occupying 442 acres on the southern tip of the island of Key Biscayne, this park provides insights into Florida’s layered cultural history. Archaeological research on the island has uncovered pre-Columbian artifacts associated with hunting and fishing activities. The 95foot tall Cape Florida Lighthouse, originally constructed in 1825, is one of the oldest standing structures in Miami-Dade County. Damaged during the Seminole Wars, the lighthouse was rebuilt in 1846 and decommissioned in 1878. Key Biscayne was also an important site on the Underground Railroad as runaway slaves disembarked from there to the Bahamas.

Landscape Type: Historic Site Public Park – State Park

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Crandon Park



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4013 S. Douglas Road, Miami Miami and Key Biscayne

Miami and Key Biscayne 4013 S. Douglas Road, Miami

The Kampong Photo courtesy The Kampong

Begun in 1916 as a personal collection of commercially-valuable tropical plants, this 11.5acre estate was the experimental garden of botanist Dr. David G. Fairchild, founder of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Office of Foreign Seed and Plant Introduction. The Kampong, named for the Javanese word meaning “village,” includes a house and compound designed in 1928 by architect Edward Clarence Dean. Following Dr. Fairchild's passing in 1954, his widow Marian remained on the property until her death in 1963, when it was purchased by horticulturist Dr. Catherine H. Sweeney. Sweeney expanded and preserved the collection, and in 1984 donated the property to what is now the National Tropical Botanical Garden. The organization later bought the adjacent property to expand the collection and protect the Kampong from encroachment.

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The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Landscape Type: Botanical Garden Designed By: Dr. David G. Fairchild Catherine H. Sweeney

Photo © Karl Gercens III

Photo courtesy The Kampong

Photo © Karl Gercens III

Situated on the edge of Biscayne Bay, the Kampong is secluded from outside view by surrounding mangrove forests and canopy trees. It is oriented towards the water, with a long manicured lawn and views of the bay framed by elaborately carved wooden gates. The plantings still reflect the style that Fairchild embraced—small-scale groupings of diverse and sustainable plants. The gardens are accented by Asian-inspired stone lanterns, wooden benches, oolitic limestone paths, and low coral stone walls and borders. The living collection includes 23 cultivars of avocado and 65 mango varieties as well as tamarind, baobab, wild citrus, black bamboo, and numerous other tropical and subtropical plants. In 1984 the property was listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic”



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Miami and Key Biscayne Miami

Miami Miami and Key Biscayne

Little Havana Though portrayed in tourist literature as a Cuban neighborhood, Little Havana is actually an ethnic mix from Cuba and all across Latin America. Lying south and west of the curving Miami River, its eastern edge borders Miami’s Brickell neighborhood while its western edge extends to SW 27th or 37th Avenues, based upon subjective interpretation. The main east-west corridors of Little Havana are SW 8th Street (Calle Ocho) and W Flagler Street. The community has witnessed successive influxes from Fidel Castro’s Cuba from the 1950s to the present. After facing socioeconomic hardships beginning in the 1980s, the neighborhood has now witnessed a rise in popularity due to revitalization efforts. Photo by Corinna J. Moebius

Design guidelines for Miami’s expansive Latin Quarter – including Little Havana – were in effect from 1979 to 2010. One of the strongest advocates for design-based zoning in Little Havana was City of Miami planner Jose Casanova, who spearheaded projects including the preservation and restoration of the iconic art deco Tower Theater on Calle Ocho, built in 1926 and listed in the National Register of Historic Places. Casanova also led the creation of Domino Plaza (la placita) next to the theater, which transformed a block of SW 15th Avenue into a public gathering place. It features a colorful granite walkway accented with a domino design bordered by a curving mosaic art wall designed by Cuban-born, identical twin artists Ronald and Nelson Curras. In the plaza, seniors – usually men – sip Cuban coffee and smoke cigars on breaks from playing dominos in Maximo Gomez Park (Domino Park) next door. 36

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Casanova also played a lead role in the expansion of Cuban Memorial Park, which extends along SW 13th Avenue from SW 8th Street to Coral Way. A winding path passes by a number of monuments including the Bay of Pigs Memorial, designed in 1972 by Monolo Reboso and Tony Lopez. Another landmark found in the park is the massive Ceiba with twisting aerial roots.

Photo by Corinna J. Moebius

Little Havana's unique character is distinguished by its covered walkways and in the way its cafes, restaurants, and bakeries open to the street through small windows known as ventanitas. Design attributes create a smooth transition between public and private uses, supporting everything from dominos and cafe culture to open air fruit markets and festivals. At the northeast corner of SW 12th Avenue and SW 6th Street, an L-shaped building houses a dance studio, art galleries, a Hispanic theater, and other small businesses. Owner Bill Fuller designed its courtyard with native and edible plants, a small stage, and multi-colored metal chairs. The residential areas of Little Havana include many historic bungalows. The best preserved, a Belvedere Bungalow, is owned and managed by Citizens for a Better South Florida. The rehabilitated site includes a restored cistern now used to irrigate native plants in its demonstration garden. Along the Miami River and below an overpass, is the popular Jose Marti Riverfront Park designed in 1985 by Wallace Roberts & Todd with extensive public input. Locals and tourists alike take in the Miami skyline from this urban oasis, while its recreation center and playgrounds are popular with neighborhood residents.

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3251 S. Miami Avenue, Miami Miami and Key Biscayne

Miami and Key Biscayne 3251 S. Miami Avenue, Miami

Vizcaya Museum & Gardens Photo by Bill Sumner, courtesy Vizcaya Museum & Gardens

The ten-acre gardens at this private estate were designed for James Deering by Colombian-born landscape architect Diego Suarez, who worked on the project between 1914 and 1917. Suarez, who had studied at Villa la Pietra outside Florence, Italy, adapted classical European Renaissance and Baroque landscape design to Miami’s subtropical climate and terrain, using native soil and plant materials in an aesthetic arrangement that evokes 16th and 17th century Italian and French gardens. From 1910 to 1916 the property’s original artistic advisor Paul Chalfin engaged his penchant for creating intensively detailed decorative elements by integrating into the lush vegetation and flamboyant architecture a collection of outdoor sculpture that showcased extraordinary objects ranging from a 2nd century Roman altar to 20th century works commissioned for Vizcaya.

Landscape Style: Italianate Mediterranean Landscape Type: Garden Estate – Country Place Era Garden Designed By: Diego Suarez Paul Chalfin James Deering

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The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo by Bill Sumner, courtesy Vizcaya Museum & Gardens

Photo by Charles Birnbaum

Photo by Bill Sumner, courtesy Vizcaya Museum & Gardens

The gardens, inspired by those Chalfin and Deering saw in Italy and France, are among the best examples of Italianate gardens in the U.S. and are unmatched in the northern hemisphere for their grandeur and carefully studied historical authenticity. Besides the gardens, the remaining acreage consists of two critically endangered forest ecosystems, and as the working heart of the estate, a “village” that includes livestock and greenhouse facilities, mechanical shops, and staff housing. The property was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1994.



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405 Biltmore Way, Coral Gables Coral Gables and Pinecrest

Coral Gables and Pinecrest 405 Biltmore Way, Coral Gables

City of Coral Gables Landscape Style: Mediterranean Beaux Arts/Neoclassical Landscape Type: Suburb – Garden City/Garden Suburb Designed By: George Merrick Frank Button Denman Fink H. George Fink Phineas Paist Related Landscapes: Biltmore Hotel Coral Gables Merrick House Venetian Pool University of Miami

Incorporated in 1925 by developer George Merrick, this Miami suburb attracted wealthy investors during the local real estate boom. Advised by landscape architect Frank Button, artist Denman Fink, and architects H. George Fink and Phineas Paist, Merrick converted 3000 acres of citrus plantation and native hammock into ornate plazas, grand entrances, small parks, monumental buildings, and tree-shaded streets. The planned community employed restrictive zoning to control development in residential, business, industrial, and recreational areas. Occasional diagonal streets interrupt the rectilinear grid, often meeting open plazas and parks. Picturesque canals, cut deep into rock outcroppings, provide vertical relief in contrast to the naturally flat landscape. Oolitic limestone quarried from what became the Venetian Pool was used for many of the subdivision’s buildings. Spanish themed fountains and plazas provide a sense of antiquity and permanence. A disastrous hurricane in 1926 ended the real estate boom. Attempting to revive the market, Merrick introduced thematic architecture and plantings including traditional styles from China, France, Italy, Mexico, Holland, and South Africa, only some of which were completed. The emergence of the Miracle Mile on a stretch of Coral Way as the city’s premiere retail street in the 1950s led to new development. In 1990 the Coral Gables Garden Club began a project to complete the seven original Merrick entrances, three of which were not originally built. Several sites in Coral Gables including the Merrick House, Venetian Pool, and the Biltmore Hotel are listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo courtesy City of Coral Gables

Photo © Steven Brooke

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Photo © Steven Brooke



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Coral Gables and Pinecrest City of Coral Gables

City of Coral Gables Coral Gables and Pinecrest

Biltmore Hotel

The 18-hole golf course is built around a canal that, in the hotel’s heyday from 1926 through the 1930s, carried guests in gondolas to Biscayne Bay. The course, designed by golf course architect Donald Ross, was originally a 36-hole complex; the adjacent Riviera Golf Course was separated from the Biltmore course in 1945. Following a period of decline, the course was restored to Ross’s design in 2007 by Brian Silva. At the same time, landscape architect Emilon Fuster refurbished the 700,000 gallon swimming pool by converting the 85-foot high diving tower into a tropical waterfall and resurfacing the pool with polished marble. The Biltmore was listed as a National Historic Landmark in 1996.

Coral Gables Merrick House 907 Coral Way Landscape Style: Mediterranean; Picturesque or “Romantic” Landscape Type: Garden and Estate Designed by: Althea Merrick; Jonathon Seymour; Coral Gables Garden Club Built in 1899 by Reverend Solomon Merrick, this residence, which served as the home base for Merrick’s 3000-acre grapefruit plantation, grew from a modest frame house to one encased in coral rock. Solomon’s wife Althea planted oaks, gumbo limbos, and rubber trees throughout her vegetable and cut flower gardens and lined the keystone walkways with low coral walls, conch shells, and crepe myrtles. In 1921 the plantation was transformed into a planned community by Solomon’s son George who named his subdivision “Coral Gables” for the oolitic limestone pillars that ornamented his childhood home, preserved on a half-acre lot. At this time, Althea added a grotto, a bamboo grove, and a fish pond planted with water lilies and irises.

Photo courtesy The Biltmore Hotel

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo courtesy City of Coral Gables

Photo courtesy The Biltmore Hotel

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Photo by Marten Kuilman

Photo © Steven Brooke

Constructed in 1926 by Coral Gables developer George Merrick and architect Leonard Schultze, this Mediterranean Revival-style hotel and golf course retains much of its historic character. With a residential neighborhood to its north and the 150-acre Biltmore Golf Course to the south, the 275-room terracotta block and stucco hotel features a fifteen-story tower modeled after one in Seville, Spain. The hotel’s horseshoe-shaped plan envelops a 60-foot square colonnaded courtyard featuring a marble fountain surrounded by palms. It was rehabilitated in 1986 and then underwent a significant restoration from 1992 to 2002.

Photo by Marten Kuilman

1200 Anastasia Avenue Landscape Style: Mediterranean Landscape Type: Courtyard; Golf Course – Golden Age Designed by: George Merrick; Leonard Schultze; Donald Ross; Brian Silva; Emilon Fuster

Following the collapse of the land boom, the house became a boarding house through the 1940s. George’s sister Ethel continued to add plantings and cared for the gardens until she passed away in 1961. At this time the property was purchased by W.L. Philbrick who funded the Merrick Manor Foundation. In 1976 the City of Coral Gables acquired the house and gardens and encouraged the Coral Gables Garden Club to undertake its restoration. Aided by historic photographs and personal interviews, the garden club worked with landscape architect Jonathon Seymour to restore the garden. Flowering and fruit trees native to Florida’s high hammock were rejuvenated or replaced, the pond was restored, and a replica sundial was set in the cut flower garden. The house, restored to its 1920s appearance, was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1973.



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Coral Gables and Pinecrest City of Coral Gables

Photo courtesy Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects

Venetian Pool 2701 De Soto Boulevard Landscape Style: Mediterranean Landscape Type: Public Park – Neighborhood Park Designed by: Denman Fink

Photo by Rocco Ceo

In keeping with George Merrick’s vision for a Mediterranean aesthetic in Coral Gables, the 820,000-gallon pool recalls design features from the Venetian Lagoon in Italy. Constructed from the original quarry that supplied oolitic limestone for the construction of many of the suburb’s ornamental entrances and buildings, the Pool opened in 1924 as the “Venetian Casino.” Artist Denman Fink transformed the former industrial site into a four-acre picturesque park for public recreation. In its early years the Pool featured gondolas imported from Italy, a high-dive platform, and performances by big band orchestras. The Venetian Pool, ranging from 4 to 8 feet deep, features an island, two waterfalls, and a grotto. Two threestory observation towers, accented by barrel tile roofs and porticos, are linked by loggias and provide views of the surrounding Coral Gables community. A Venetian-inspired bridge connects the limestone-encrusted pool edge with the sandy island vegetated with palms. Terrazzo tiles and lighting modeled after maritime navigation light poles contribute to the romantic Venetian setting while coconut palms, Royal Poinciana, and bougainvillea nest the Venetian Pool firmly in Florida’s unique subtropical environment. Fed by artesian wells and drained daily, the pool was retrofitted in 1998 with injection wells to sustainably recycle the water back into the aquifer. In 1981 the Venetian Pool was listed in the National Register of Historic Places.

University of Miami 1223 Theo Dickinson Drive Landscape Style: Mediterranean; Modernist Landscape Type: Campus – Multiversity Campus Designed by: George Merrick; Denman Fink; Phineas Paist; Marion Manley; Robert Law Weed; Robert M. Little Chartered a year before the 1926 hurricane that ushered the collapse of the Florida land boom, this campus began as a 160-acre donation of land by George Merrick, developer of Coral Gables. The site was chosen for its natural vegetation, the centrally located 8.5-acre Lake Osceola, and the picturesque canal that connected the lake to Biscayne Bay. In keeping with Merrick’s vision for Coral Gables, a master plan influenced by Mediterranean architecture and landscape design that would employ abundant massings of subtropical plants was developed but never realized. Though the cornerstone of its first building was laid in 1926, campus construction was halted until after World War II.

Photo by Marten Kuilman

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo by Marten Kuilman

Photo © Steven Brooke

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Photo courtesy Nelson Byrd Woltz Landscape Architects

City of Coral Gables Coral Gables and Pinecrest

After the initial construction, architects Marion Manley, Robert Law Weed, and Robert M. Little designed a Modernist master plan for the campus in 1947. Asymmetrical blocks of long, narrow buildings painted in primary colors were sited to take advantage of open, airy green spaces offset by a minimal, abstracted landscape. Palms demarcated perimeters and reinforced axial paths while dense understory and groundcover created a garden-like setting for outdoor study spaces. Today, the campus has grown to 260 acres including the three-acre John C. Gifford Arboretum, a Florida Keys arboretum on the lakeshore, and a palmetum on the western edge. The historic core of the campus is encircled by recreational fields, parking lots, and more robust architectural blocks capable of withstanding hurricanes. In 2009 Cooper, Robertson & Partners and Nelson Byrd Woltz completed a master plan to unite the Modernist campus, Mediterranean landscape, and guide future growth.



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10901 Old Cutler Road, Coral Gables Coral Gables and Pinecrest

Coral Gables and Pinecrest 10901 Old Cutler Road, Coral Gables

Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden Photo courtesy Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden

Established in 1938, this 83-acre site is an abundant collection of palms, cycads, flowering trees and shrubs, vines, and fruit trees. It is home to more than 6000 plant species, many endangered in their native habit. Benefactor Col. Robert H. Montgomery named the garden for Dr. David G. Fairchild, botanist and founder of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Office of Foreign Seed and Plant Introduction. Landscape architect William Lyman Phillips, principal designer for Dade County Parks, directed the work over 28 years working with landscape architect Noel Chamberlin on the initial master plan.

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The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Landscape Type: Botanical Garden Designed By: Dr. David G. Fairchild William Lyman Phillips Noel Chamberlin Civilian Conservation Corps Robert Fitch Smith

Photo courtesy Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden

Photo courtesy Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden

Photo courtesy Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden

Phillip’s design, largely implemented by the Civilian Conservation Corps, is notable for its divergent experiences. Throughout the garden, wide vistas and openings are contrasted with intimate, shaded pathways and garden rooms. Utilizing a bare rock escarpment that divides the property into upland and lowland sections, Phillips employed axial geometries and taxonomic families as organizing principles for the garden. On the upper section, radial paths originate near the oolitic limestone gatehouse, pass through alternating grass lawns and pools, and converge in the Palm Glade overlooking expansive lowlands. In the lower section, Phillips contrasted this densely planted formality with loosely structured open spaces and lakes drawn from natural sinkholes. Formal plant massings found near the Garden Club of America Amphitheater are counterbalanced by naturalistic plantings near the Museum and Garden House, both designed by Robert Fitch Smith. The 560-foot long stone and wood Vine Pergola near the Visitor Center was restored in 1994.

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic” Beaux Arts/Neoclassical



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11000 S. Red Road, Pinecrest Coral Gables and Pinecrest

Coral Gables and Pinecrest 10001 Old Cutler Road, Coral Gables

Designed By: William Lyman Phillips Civilian Conservation Corps

Phillips designed the entrance road on the park's northern edge to unify the experience of passing from a homogeneous swamp, through dense mangrove forest, and into the open cove of Biscayne Bay. A large marina provides boat access on the north end of the park, while the southern end features a sandy beach punctuated by royal palms. Phillips's crews constructed miles of coral stone walls to link the park's diverse ecologies and erected limestone picnic shelters in open lawn expanses, in oak groves, and along the shorelines of small lakes found in the western part of the park. Through extensive dredging Phillips created a saltwater atoll pool projecting into the bay to provide a protected swimming area surrounded by limestone, coral, and sandy beaches. The pool, fed by the bay's changing tides, is enclosed by a wide curving walkway lined with palms that offers sweeping views of the bay and Key Biscayne.

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo © Steven Brooke

Photo courtesy Miami-Dade Parks

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In 2002 the Parrot Jungle theme park relocated to nearby Watson Island and later renamed Jungle Island. A year later, following the development of a master plan designed by architects Rodriguez and Quiroga, the former Parrot Jungle theme park site was reopened as Pinecrest Gardens, a city cultural arts park that retains much of the original architecture and plantings. It was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 2011 as part of the Parrot Jungle Historic District.

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic” Landscape Type: Botanical Garden Public Park – Neighborhood Park Designed By: Franz Scherr Rodriguez and Quiroga

Photo courtesy Shannon Tracy

Landscape Type: Public Park – Large Municipal Park

Originally a theme park known as Parrot Jungle, this 20-acre park was designed and established in 1936 by entrepreneur Franz Scherr to capitalize on Miami’s burgeoning tourist industry. Located in a pre-settlement cypress slough on a rare hardwood hammock, the park incorporated the site's existing topography and plant material as a backdrop for bird habitats and animal performance venues. Scherr created a meandering trail to weave through lush vegetation, open lawns, and more formal gardens, and used local coral and limestone for an entrance station, restaurant pavilions, and parrot cages. Around the park he co-mingled native pines with imported talipot palms, rubber trees, and banana plants. A banyan tree planted in 1947 occupies the center of the park, while a succulent garden, constructed in the 1960s, dominates terraced land between Swan Lake and the Meadow. Two acres of cypress slough and a three-acre remnant of tropical hardwood hammock are also preserved. Patterned brick walkways connect many of the historic landscape features, including an outdoor theater, an exhibit area, and an amphitheater.

In 1930 industrial chemical entrepreneur William J. Matheson donated 85 acres of beachfront property to Dade County for a park, which the county quickly expanded to more than 600 acres, much of it mangrove and hardwood forest. In 1936 William Lyman Phillips was hired to design the park. Working with the Civilian Conservation Corps, Phillips produced a plan that provided public amenities - including beaches, picnic areas, and boating facilities - while simultaneously protecting the land's significant natural resources, particularly the extensive undeveloped forests.

Photo courtesy Shannon Tracy

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic”

(Parrot Jungle)

Photo courtesy Shannon Tracy

Matheson Hammock Park

Pinecrest Gardens



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16701 SW 72nd Avenue, Miami Cutler Bay and Homestead

Cutler Bay and Homestead 16701 SW 72nd Avenue, Miami

Deering Estate at Cutler Landscape Style: Mediterranean Beaux Arts/Neoclassical Landscape Type: Garden and Estate – Country Place Era Garden Designed By: Charles Deering John Kunkel Small Charles Torrey Simpson Phineas Paist

Beginning in 1913 Charles Deering began amassing land for his Cutler estate, roughly 30 miles south of his existing home and plant nursery in Buena Vista. His half-brother James’ estate thirteen miles away, Vizcaya, was begun around the same time. Working with botanist John Kunkel Small and naturalist Charles Torrey Simpson, Deering relocated plants from Buena Vista to create working and experimental farms, while simultaneously preserving the site’s significant swaths of native mangrove forest, hardwood hammock and pine rockland. Located along the edge of Biscayne Bay, the estate includes the Richmond Inn, which Deering renovated as a family residence. Between 1916 and 1922 Deering hired architect Phineas Paist to design a Mediterranean Revival stone mansion to complement the inn. The mansion, oriented towards the water, looks out over a broad open lawn and a keyhole-shaped boat turning basin with parallel jetties planted with evenly-spaced palms. The palm-lined roads and cultivated areas were part of a working estate that also incorporated rustic bridges and boardwalks passing through native woodlands and hammocks. The property also contains significant geological features and pre-contact Native American archaeological sites. In 1985 the State of Florida and Miami-Dade County purchased the property, adding 34 acres to the south and 45 acres to the north. In 1992 Hurricane Andrew caused significant damage to the estate; since then the County and the Deering Foundation have begun to restore the ecological systems surrounding the estate. At 444 acres today, the property was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1986.

The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Photo © Karl Gercens III

Photo by Brian F. Call Photography

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Photo by Brian F. Call Photography



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24801 SW 187th Avenue, Homestead Cutler Bay and Homestead

Cutler Bay and Homestead 24801 SW 187th Avenue, Homestead

Fruit and Spice Park Photo by Chris Rollins

This 37-acre subtropical botanical garden in the historic Redland agricultural community in Homestead features more than 500 varieties of fruits, spices, herbs, and nuts from around the world. Originally settled in 1907 by homesteaders and citrus farmers, the Redland community was affected by several tropical storms and floods. In 1944 Dade County purchased 20 acres – including a one-room schoolhouse and a coral rock structure built in 1913 – to be developed as subtropical fruit demonstration gardens. In 1944 William Lyman Phillips completed a master plan for the park. The park’s first superintendent Mary Calkins Heinlein is credited with developing the park until she retired in 1959. In 1982, the BauerNeill-Mitchell House, constructed 80 years earlier and 8 miles away, was relocated to the park and sited amidst mature fruit trees and extensive garden beds.

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The Cultural Landscape Foundation

Landscape Type: Public Park – Neighborhood Park Designed By: Tammy Cook Kevin Asher Chris Rollins

Photo by Chris Rollins

Photo by Chris Rollins

Photo © Steven Brooke

In 1992 several structures and more than 750 mature trees were destroyed by Hurricane Andrew. Landscape architect Tammy Cook, Miami-Dade Parks planner Kevin Asher, and Fruit and Spice Park manager Chris Rollins redesigned the park to display medicinal and food plants grouped according to five distinct geographic regions. The park's master plan, completed in 1994, also included an oolitic limestone pool and cascade, a formal herb garden, and a centrally-located lake. Federal Emergency Managements Agency funds were used to reconstruct the schoolhouse and the Bauer-Neill-Mitchell House. Several land acquisitions have doubled the size of the park and a motorized tram shuttles visitors to the themed gardens that were built following the hurricane.

Landscape Style: Picturesque or “Romantic”



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What’s Out There® Weekend highlights the nation’s rich and diverse landscape heritage through a series of free interpretive tours led by expert guides. Hosted in different cities every year, What’s Out There Weekend brings to light the unique landscape legacy and local character of each city, defined by its publicly accessible parks, gardens, plazas, cemeteries, memorials, and neighborhoods. An extension of the What’s Out There database, What’s Out There Weekend provides people with new ways to experience first-hand the landscapes that they see every day but often overlook. To learn more about the sites in this guide, go online and find out about: • individual sites • the site’s designer, type, and style • link to the site’s primary website • related articles or other materials on TCLF’s Web site Photo by Robin Hill

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Cover: Photo by Bill Sumner, courtesy Vizcaya Museum & Gardens

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© 2014 The Cultural Landscape Foundation, all rights reserved. The marks "The Cultural Landscape Foundation", “Landslide", "Pioneers of American Landscape Design", and "What's Out There" are registered trademarks of The Cultural Landscape Foundation®.

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